Not far behind
by livke
Summary: Rex discovers that many of the truths he had clung to were, after all, not so true, Ahsoka makes another difficult choice and Luke discovers the value of a certain point of view. Multi-scene spanning ANH - ESB - ROTS.
1. Greivous' words of wisdom

**0 ABY (five days after the Battle of Yavin)**

 ** _Lothal, headquarters of the Lothal Rebel Cell_**

The seeds of the Rebellion, carefully planted across the galaxy during twenty years of oppression, had finally bloomed in the skies above Scarif, and the frantic aftermath of that horrific battle had led, at last, to the explosion of an all-out war - and the less metaphoric explosion of the dreaded Death Star. Now, as the plan to restore the Republic seemed to be more than a wild bantha chase, the heads of the Rebel Alliance had sent a number of envoys to the cells scattered across the Galaxy, asking them to join forces and planning the next moves against the Empire. The identity of the envoy sent to Lothal, Princess Organa herself, was a testament to the central standing of the local cell in the Rebellion; the Princess was now in a meeting with General Syndulla, and Captain Rex, former CT-7567, had been tasked with the unpleasant duty of entertaining the Princess' pilot.

With a satisfied groan, the young man - who had introduced himself as Han - slammed his now empty glass on the table, and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. Rex didn't really want to believe that _this_ man had actually fought in the Battle of Yavin. Han was the furthest thing from a soldier Rex could have ever imagined, slumped as he was on a fuel tank refashioned as a stool, his legs outstretched on the table – well, a durasteel container refashioned as table –, his head leant back to rest against the plastene wall of the makeshift cantina.

In all fairness, in the last few days almost no one had behaved like a proper soldier, and the _makeshift cantina_ right inside the Rebellion Headquarters was a blatant proof to that. Yavin IV had been a major victory, of course, but this wasn't really an excuse for the men to get drunk everyday - Dogma would probably have had seizures, had he been there to witness it. During the few spare moments he'd had in the last few days, Rex had lazily wondered what his Generals would have done had something like that happened during the Clone Wars. He could almost picture General Kenobi rolling his eyes and making a flippant remark about the uncivilized lassitude of victorious troops, only to suddenly turn serious again and reminding everyone that the war was not over yet; General Skywalker would have probably joined the men for a drink – and Kenobi would have grudgingly followed suit. According to clone rumors, Grevious had once said that _where there is Kenobi, you will always find Skywalker not far behind_ ; Rex knew only too well that the reverse had been equally true.

"Too bad the Emperor wasn't there to enjoy the show himself", Han was saying, a slothful smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

Rex sipped his ale thoughtfully. "And what about Chief Buckethead?", he enquired.

Han snorted and gestured the Ithorian waiter to refill his drink. "Who, Vader? He escaped, old Palps' akk pup. The Emperor paraded him in Imp City this morning."

"Well, you can't have everything in life", Rex sighed, massaging his increasingly stiffening neck. Not having the Death Star anymore was, for the moment, more than enough.

"I'm afraid it will take more than a simple explosion to blast Vader into oblivion", Han mused, as he gulped down his third shot of the day. "Not even Kenobi's fancy laser sword could do the trick."

Rex froze, feeling his blood draining from his face. He _couldn't_ have heard that right.

"Sorry, sir? Laser sword?", he asked, his knuckles white against the pitcher he was clutching in his hand.

"Yeah, that old Jedi stuff. The fool tried to buy us time and cut Vader down. Mind you, I'm grateful, but it wasn't pretty to see."

Well, there were two options, Rex thought, as he tried to rationalize. Either someone had crushed a deathstick into his beer, or…

"Kenobi, you said? Kenobi… _who_?"

Han waved his hand dismissively.

"An old crazed wizard. Her Highness swears he was _the_ General Kenobi of the Clone Wars. Aged badly, if you ask me."

 _Kenobi. General in the Clone Wars. Obi-Wan Kenobi. Alive._

"Yes… yes, of course", Rex muttered without thinking, his eyes almost out of their sockets. "Where is he?"

"What do you think?", the man smirked, rolling his eyes. "Going at Vader with a glowing stick? Bought a one-way ticket for a tete-a-tete with the Force."

Somewhat distantly, Rex felt his shoulders slumping and his hold on the pitcher slackening. The clunk as it fell to the floor, spilling beer all over his trousers, brought him back to himself.

"I thought he was dead", he whispered.

"Well, he surely is now. Oh. You knew him?", Han asked, his voice tinged with slight disbelief as he became conscious, a little too late, of his conspicuous lack of tact.

"A long time ago", Rex whispered, diving under the makeshift table to mop up the beer and hide the moisture stinging at his eyes.

* * *

Extreme situations call for extreme measures.

Given the extreme extremeness of that particular situation, Rex was pretty sure that Corellian brandy wasn't too an extreme measure, after all. He had never been prone to drinking but, well, too much was too much. It seemed almost fitting – and in hindsight it certainly looked predictable –that the red line of _his_ "too much" had to be crossed by Kenobi. Either him, or Skywalker.

Kenobi, alive for twenty years. _Kenobi_ , in _hiding._ Kenobi, of all people.

In hiding, leaving Ahsoka once again on her own, leaving her to mourn them alone.

A part of him, the part that was still Capitain Rex of the 501st, was trying to rationalise, saying that Kenobi would surely have had a good reason to hide and let the world believe he was dead. Another part of him, that of Rex the man and the rebel, the Rex that was going to abandon his past as a soldier behind as soon as the war was finally over, couldn't help picturing the image of a lonely Jedi hiding from the world after his world had been destroyed, the image of a broken Jedi who had spent twenty years mourning his lost brother. Rex could sympathize, of course; after all, he himself had lived in hiding before answering to Ahsoka's call. Only, from his Jedi General, he would have expected _more_.

Of course, what truly burned was the very bad timing of his death. Couldn't the man have waited for a few more days, after waiting for twenty years?

The only happy thought – and the fact that he could define it as a _happy thought_ was saying something – was that Kenobi had died in battle, fighting face to face with the archenemy of his lot, and not shot in the back by one of the men he had trusted with his life. He had deserved more than to die with the bitter taste of betrayal in his mouth; at least in this, the Force had been merciful.

He was still brooding – a word that hadn't been part of his vocabulary until half an hour ago – when a small hand clasped his shoulder.

"Rex, Hera – Sith's blood _,_ Rex, have you been drinking? You smell worse than Hondo! – Hera wants to see you in her office."

Slowly, somewhat clumsily, Rex turned his head to regard the newcomer. Mandalorian. Short purple air.

"Satine." No, that was Kenobi's duchess – Kenobi's girlfriend, according to Skywalker. Why did Mandalorians like these variations on a name? Not even _clones_ had so little imagination, for kriff's sake! "Sabine. Thank you. I'll be going."

Mustering all the dignity of an war-worn veteran, Rex got to his feet under Sabine's suspicious gaze. As soon as he was standing, he realized that the drowsiness he felt was not to be blamed on the alcohol. He was not drunk, not even slightly. He was… thunderstruck.

In a haze he reached Hera's office, a prefab room cramped with plasteel boxes full of flimsi and holopads and droid spare parts; Chopper's continuous shrieking only added to the overall confusion. As his eyes fell on the young General's swollen belly, he found himself once again admiring her strength and her indomitable dedication to the Rebel cause. Not even the advanced stage of her pregnancy had stopped her from fighting at Scarif, and only the severest ban of her med-droid had forced her to stay behind as her crew flew towards Yavin.

"Rex, come sit here", she greeted him; in all her weariness, she still found the strength to smile. When he sat on the chair across her desk, she wrinkled her nose in distaste. Well, corellian brandy was strong.

"Rex, what have you… Oh." As realization came, her slender hand moved to rest on his, young fingers gently squeezing the older ones. "You already know."

Rex nodded gravely. "The Princess' pilot told me." He sighed. "I thought he was dead."

Hera's large eyes were full of compassion.

"We all did, Rex. This… this doesn't make sense. I didn't tell the Princess you knew him, I wanted to speak with you beforehand. What do you think, Rex? Why would he hide for twenty years?"

Rex shook his head. "No idea, General. I… it doesn't add up." He exhaled slowly. To lose a friend once was bad, to lose one twice... "Why did he come out of hiding?"

"That's the only simple answer, Rex. After Scarif, when the Tantive was boarded, Princess Organa hid the Deathstar plans in a R2 unit and put it into an escape pod with a protocol droid, with the order to bring the plans to General Kenobi."

An intense sense of deja-vu settled in the pit of Rex' stomach with the same grace of the proverbial bantha in a china shop. R2 units had been out of production for more than twenty years. He had a _very_ bad feeling about this.

"A 3PO unit, perhaps?", he asked, trying to keep his voice as uncommitted as possible.

Hera frowned. "How did you know?"

The bantha in his stomach made a backflip. Only the Force knew what Kenobi could have thought in seeing his exile ended by the appearance of Skyalker's bossy astromech and Amidala's idiotic droid.

"I… knew the droids. Cocky astromech and fussy protocol droid, that's them. Can't believe they're still around", he said, massaging his knotted neck. "So Senator Organa knew he was alive."

"He did. Leia doesn't know why he lied. I'm afraid we'll never know now."

"Where was he hiding?", Rex asked, still unable to really picture Kenobi in hiding.

"Ezra was right. He was on Tatooine."

The bantha had apparently turned into a Super Star Destroyer.

"Tatooine", Rex repeated, inanely.

 _Tatooine._ Tatooine, of all karking places. Skywalker's homeplanet.

"Tatooine. What in the blazes was he doing there?"

Hera shook her head, her lekku swinging behind her.

"No idea."

"Sorry, General, but I don't understand. Kenobi was hiding on Tatooine… The little droid brought him the plans of the Death Star... and he just went to the Death Star to challenge Darth Vader? The General has always been reckless, but this…"

Hera sighed in dismay. "No, he was headed for Alderaan. He found the Death Star instead."

Rex lowered his head. "So he went to free the Princess." He wouldn't expect anything less from the General.

"Actually, his two companions went to save her. Kenobi engaged Vader to give them the chance to escape."

Rex couldn't suppress a bitter chuckle. "That's our General." He tried not to think of what Cody would have said. "Always risking his life to save others."

Hera's eyes lost focus for a moment. "I just realized… He saved the whole rebellion", she said, more to herself than to Rex. "It's like Kanan said, the will of the Force… Had Skywalker died there, the Death Star –"

"Skywalker?", Rex blurted, interrupting her.

No, this time he couldn't have _possibly_ heard right. It was all wistful thinking.

Hera regarded him with a mildly curious stare. "Yes, Luke Skywalker. The boy who came with Kenobi from Tatooine, the one who blew up the Death Star."

In the following years, Rex could never remember how that conversation had ended. At some point, he must have excused himself and left a puzzled General Syndulla to sort things on her own, because the next thing he remembered was waking up on his cot with a splitting headache and a salty taste on his lips.

The first articulate thought he could remember was his realization that Grevious was still right, even after twenty years and against all odds.

 _Where there is Kenobi, you will always find Skywalker not far behind._


	2. Another Skywalker

3 ABY (Five days before the battle of Hoth)

 _Hyperspace, somewhere along the southern part of the Corellian Spire, between Manpha and Hoth_

"I'm too old for this kind of Jedi stunts," Rex grumbled, his beard scratching against the smooth and warm skin of a lek whose stripes he had thought he would never see again.

"I am no Jedi," Ahsoka reminded him as she gently disengaged from his embrace, a slim hint of regret in her voice – a strange kind of regret, one Rex couldn't really pinpoint, one that stemmed not from the moment but from a memory elicited by her own words.

Rex cocked his brow, but didn't reply at her remark; he settled for taking her in eagerly, basking unashamedly in the happiness that this most unexpected meeting had brought him. In his book, few people were entitled to call themselves Jedi more than Commander Tano, but if there was something his years serving under General Skywalker had taught him it was not to take sides in these philosophical diatribes.

"It seems you kept the bad habits," he merely said.

"Stunts like what? I don't remember throwing you down a wall," she said, flashing him a grin and graciously setting upon the comm console, which was just high enough for her long legs to be left dangling a few inches from the floor, in a very unconvincing imitation of the way she sat on the inlaid bunks in the troopers' quarters on the Resolute when she was nothing more than a gangly teenager. The image of Rex hurtling down that huge fortress on Geonosis resounded between them with no need for the Force. Rex snorted.

"I'm talking about that kind of stunts in which you Jedi let people believe that you're dead only to pop up after awhile healthy as a krayt, just as General Kenobi did," he said, his glee for once overcoming his ability to keep his mouth shout. _Kriff. I shouldn't have said that_.

Ahsoka, though, put his worry to ease at once, for she sobered immediately.

"Oh. Yes. That was not nice of him. Though, in my defense, mine at least wasn't a deliberate deceit."

She knew. Rex let out the breath he had been holding. He acknowledged her grief with a brief nod, but knew there was no need to reopen that wound, so he pulled a chair and sat before her.

"What happened to you, then, Ahsoka?"

Ahsoka shivered and Rex knew it had nothing to do with the low setting of the therm regulator.

"I'm not sure," she replied. "Some Jedi weird stuff," she added, a sly smile emerging from behind the veil of aloof melancholy she had worn since Mandalore and Order 66.

But Rex was not so easily sidetracked. "You should never have faced him on your own, Ahsoka, going against someone skilled enough to kill Kenobi… How did you manage to escape?" he asked her, trying to keep the blunt edge of worry from his voice. He was immoderately proud of her, his brilliant, beautiful, brave sister-daughter-brother-in-arms, but this didn't excuse her from her unforgivable recklessness – an hereditary tract, and he had a precise idea to what part of her lineage she owed it.

But Ahsoka was not listening. She had slowly slid down the console and was now kneeling before Rex, in what he had learnt to recognize as a meditation pose, her small hands shakily searching for his, her wide-eyed face pale and drenched of all blood.

"It is true then?" she asked, her voice barely more than a whisper.

Oh. So she didn't knew all the tale. She only knew he had been alive all these years – Rex was almost inclined to forgive the General for this, at least he had not left _her_ in the dark – but she had not heard about his death yet. _Kriff._ He slid down his chair and knelt with her on the floor. "I thought you knew," he said miserably. "I am sorry, Ahsoka."

He had never seen such deep horror in her eyes, not even during that dreadful business with Knight Offee, not even during Order 66. It resounded in her innermost core, more intimate than the Force itself.

"Bail told me he'd been killed… He never said _who_ … I-I suspected, but I never… I had hoped" she moaned, twin trails of crystal-clear moisture staining her cheeks.

Rex frowned, looking away. He couldn't stand watching her weep. "Bail… Bail who?"

It was Ahsoka's turn to frown. "Bail Organa, of course," she said, wiping the tears from her face with one sleeve.

At this, Rex gaped, utterly dumbstruck. Not an unwelcome surprise, to be sure, but definitely an unexpected one. "The Senator is still alive?" he asked, bewildered at this string of miraculous survivals. _What in the blazes...?_

"No, of course not," Ahsoka replied, wearing the same expression Rex felt on his own face, one that grew more and more confused by the minute. "He died with Alderaan."

Well. He was _definitely_ missing something.

"But the General engaged Vader on the Death Star right after the destruction of Alderaan, to let..." _No. No, perhaps it is best to avoid this detail for now._ "To let the Princess of Alderaan escape. Bail Organa was already dead by then, Ahsoka."

Ahsoka was beyond mystified. "I must have been out of the loop longer than I thought," she said. "We are definitely not talking about the same Kenobi. Unless you're telling me Obi-Wan had a son?" she feebly jested.

"No, no, that's General Skywalker who had a son! It was General Kenobi on the Death Star, Ahsoka. He gave up his life to let them escape, Skywalker's son and Organa's daughter…"

"No, Rex, stop," Ahsoka said at last, on the verge of a very un-Jedi panic. She had most _definitely_ not heard that right. "This doesn't make any sense. Are you alright?" she added, her voice threaded with faint worry.

"Ahsoka, you just said you knew the General deliberately faked his death."

"And how could I forget, you've no idea what it was like, for me and for Ana-… No," she hissed, as realization dawned. "He… All these years… Obi-Wan was _alive_?"

Rex nodded, a lump in his throat. What a fine mess. "He went out of hiding when Princess Organa sent him the plans of the Death Star."

"He was _hiding_? He has been hiding for nineteen _kriffin'_ years? Where? Why?"

"On Tatooine."

He saw her put two and two together. Kenobi, Tatooine... Skywalker. It was pure mathematics.

"And what did you say about…? Rex?"

Rex forced himself to look her in the eyes. Gently, he took her hands in his and stroke her slim fingers.

"Your Master had a son. Luke Skywalker. The boy who destroyed the Death Star. He lived on Tatooine."

Pride bloomed inside him for his General's offspring. His daddy's boy, there was no doubt.

* * *

Too much. That was definitely too much.

 _You killed Obi-Wan! How could you?_

Somehow, this hurt even more than the fact that he had tried to kill _her_. Anakin Skywalker had loved her, she had never had any doubt about that, but Obi-Wan… They were _The Team._ And a brother had killed the other. _Oh Force, why are you so cruel? What is the lesson in this?_

 _And he had a son! A son! Oh, Anakin, why? Why? Padmé... Padmé, I'm so sorry. Had I been there, perhaps.._

"I am sorry the General never told you, Ahsoka." Rex' words brought her back to reality.

"No, I understand why he did it." Of course. To protect. To protect the child from his own father, from Obi-Wan's own brother.

"To be honest, I don't," Rex observed sternly. "There was no reason he could not make contact with you during these years."

 _Oh, Rex, if you only knew… Pray you never will, my friend._

"There is, Rex, more than you can possibly imagine. You'll have to trust me on this one." One corner of her lips curled, just slightly.

Rex snorted. "You're the expert on Jedi weirdness, Commander."

"And experience outranks everything," she added. Their eyes met, and through tears and pain they smiled. "Rex, this Luke Skywalker? Have you met him?"

Rex shook his head. "I wish I had. I tried to, but I was not sure… He's a Jedi." Ahsoka's heart skipped a beat. _A Jedi. Another Knight Skywalker._ "I saw his lightsaber on his belt and made a few enquires. Been trained by the General himself, even if, as rumor has it, only for a few days. I didn't know how much I'm supposed to say. I bet he's starving for information about his father, but you know I don't want to get entangled in Jedi business more than I already am."

Beneath the mirth and the good-hearted abusive jests, Ahsoka saw true concern.

"You've grown as old and wise as Master Yoda, Rex."

They chuckled heartily together for a few precious seconds. They were all they had left of their lives. It was just the two of them, in a dark Galaxy where the bright flame that now burned, waiting to engulf the darkness, was one they didn't completely understand, one they didn't know how to fit in.

"I believe you did the right thing, Rex," she said at last, getting on her feet and staring at the molted lights of hyperspace. She felt him rise and stand beside her. "If he's indeed training to become a Jedi, he needs to be focused on the present moment, no distraction allowed. The enemy he's facing it too…" Another realization. _Enemy. Father._ _Son. Brother. No._ _No. Obi-Wan, what have you done? Does the boy know? Please, tell me you told him. Obi-Wan!_

"Ahsoka?" Rex enquired, squeezing her shoulder and grounding her to reality.

"I… I'm sorry, Rex. I was thinking, I-I would like to see this boy," she added, a treacherous sting burning in her eyes.

"We're headed were he is, at Echo Base."

Ahsoka turned towards him, a quizzical smile on her lips. " _Echo_ base?"

Rex almost blushed… almost. "I might have suggested the name. Apparently people think it's because of the _actual_ kriffin' _echo_."

"I am sorry," Ahsoka offered, gently brushing his arm. She was sorry. "He deserves to be remembered."

Rex frowned, deep in thought. "I am not sorry," he said at last, slowly. "It is not for them to remember. They are all good people, this Rebel lot, and they fight as true warriors, if not as true soldiers. They are passionate and brave. But they don't understand, Ahsoka, they never will. They can't. They fight against something that is so _evil_ that there is almost no moral dilemma. It is all clear-cut. In the singular actions, there may be a dilemma, but not in the grand scheme of things. They fight for freedom, for hope. We never knew what we were fighting for. The Republic, of course, but I'm sure not even you Jedi ever truly believed that _bantha chizzsk_. We all knew from the start we didn't really know what was going on. Sometimes we fought for the people… but sometimes we just fought for ourselves. For our brothers. Yours, and mine. And the more we fought, the more we won, the more we died… the worse it became. Krell, your friend Offee, Tup, Fives. Even you Jedi started questioning the war. My brothers were afraid it would end – what were we going to do then? What would have happened to us? How would the Republic _dispose_ of us? The longer we fought, the more we died... but we were afraid of peace." Ahsoka was speechless, her eyes closed. "Those Rebels will never understand." Stiffly, he turned and entered the cockpit, settling in the pilot seat.

Ahsoka nodded, weary, and followed him, sitting as his co-pilot. "No, they won't." She sighed. "We are relics of another era."

The proximity sensor blared and Rex reverted the ship to realspace, where the gleaming mass of Hoth waited for them in its glacial splendor.

Ahsoka felt a sense of unease stir in Rex, a seed of doubt that bloomed into a green tendril of hope.

"What's it, Rex?"

He rolled his eyes. She grimaced.

"Ouch. Sorry. Forgot you don't like it when I do that."

"No to worry," he said, as he punched the coordinates and their clearance code for landing. When he was finished, he turned towards her." I was just wondering… You were purportedly dead, and here you are. General Kenobi the same – well, almost, I mean, he survived almost twenty years… Ahsoka, don't you think…?"

It was probably the first time Ahsoka had heard Rex not finishing a question, unable to press on, to utter in its entirety that swelling hope that was now rising and rising and sprouting tender green leaves.

She looked into the earnest eyes of this brave, kind, _good_ man, a man who had known _slavery_ and death and grief and loss and betrayal and who was still here, with a smile on his face and hope in his heart, eager to fight for a better world in which he would most likely never live. He deserved to know. More than anyone else, he deserved to know.

Ahsoka never knew if she did it for him or for herself… or for Anakin.

She crushed the blooming sprout under her heel.

"Anakin is dead, Rex. Killed by Darth Vader when the Emperor ordered him to march on the Jedi Temple."

She did not shield herself from the raw pain in Rex' soul, the tender seedling turning to dust, dust to dust, into the Force that created us and onto which we shall return. His warm eyes, usually of the color of the earth after the rain, were now as dry and lifeless as the Jundland Wastes.

"Are you sure?" he asked.

 _Anakin Skywalker was weak. I destroyed him._ "He was my Master, Rex. I felt his death." She blinked away tears. _Then I will avenge his death._ "Anakin is gone." _Then you will die._

Crushing the sprout of hope was mercy. Better than see it turn into a beautiful, tall, slender tree only to watch it being consumed by the raging inferno of truth's pitiless fires, until nothing more than a blackened stump remained, lying on a wasted shore, the pleading mockery of what had been, of what would never, could never be again.

They remained in grieved silence through the planetary descent, as Hoth's snowstorms rose to swallow them in their lethal beauty, white, cold, white and cold as death itself… and in all that whiteness, something else rose white, and it was not made of ice but of light, white dazzling light, clear as a white dwarf yet powerful as a supernova, and it called to her, it resounded in her, familiar, family, family… and then, as the shadow of a smile tugged, at last, at her lips again… something else attracted her spirit, something less clear, less defined, and yet… _oh sweet Force._

 _You couldn't really do anything by halves, could you, Master?_

There was another.

Another Skywalker.


End file.
